Tim Minchin does not believe in the concept of "tempting fate" and attempted to prove it at the Telegraph Hay Festival by announcing: “I hope my daughter dies tomorrow in a car crash.”

We should all let go of the superstitious and illogical belief that saying something terrible increases the likelihood of it coming to pass, Minchin said.

The comedian and writer of Matilda the Musical was addressing an appreciative audience at Hay, but there were gasps of shock when he mentioned his child. Minchin is father to Violet, five, and Caspar, two.

In a discussion about superstition and taboos, Minchin declared: “I hope my daughter dies tomorrow in a car crash on the way home from Hay. I’ll tweet if she does.”

He followed that up: “That seems hard, but it’s not hard because it doesn’t mean anything. No-one here thinks I mean that. I’m not going to manifest it.” He joked: “I’ll tweet tomorrow if she does.”

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“Superstition is something that one should divest oneself of. It’s not helpful, and often it’s harmful.

“I always say to people when they get on a plane, ‘Don’t have a plane crash!’ There’s a sense that the odds might be higher, or if I do a joke about my baby dying the odds might be greater. But there’s no way that can be the case.

“It’s incredibly empowering to get rid of superstition. It’s deep within us because we’re megalomaniacs – we think we can make a plane crash with our words.”

The topic arose when an audience member asked Minchin if he was “tempting fate” with the Lullaby, a comic song about a parent’s frustration with a crying child.

It includes the lyrics:

What else can I do to put a stop to/This mind numbing noise you are making?/Where is the line between patting and hitting?/When is rocking rocking, and when is it shaking?/

I don’t know what else I can do, to try and hush you/My heart says I love you but my brain’s thinking f--- you/And hoping a child trafficker will abduct you/At least then I’d get a few hours in bed.

Tim Minchin barefoot at the Hay Festival / CLARA MOLDEN

Minchin said: “Lullaby is a song about when your kids don’t go to sleep and you just want to shake them - the violent thoughts that flick through your head when you’re ultra-tired.

“It’s taboo to say that, but [my wife] Sarah and I are quite dark. It’s obviously upsetting to people whose kids have died.

“But I joke about this in my shows - people say, ‘Ooh, let’s check on the baby’ but I say if the kid’s dead we can’t do anything about it, so we might as well get some sleep.

“And I have had mothers of young children stop me in the street and say, ‘Thank you so much, you got me through the night’.”

Minchin insisted that he was not being controversial for the sake of it, an accusation often levelled at Frankie Boyle. "I hope I'm not talking about taboos for the sake of it. I think taboos can do damage and I guess I'm interested in those ones."

Minchin has signed up to play Judas in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s new production of Jesus Christ Superstar. The Australian is the new toast of the West End following his success with Matilda the Musical, but he laughed off suggestions of any rivalry.

“It’s so weird that people want conflict, they want the incomer to be disdainful of the granddaddy,” said Minchin.

“Andrew Lloyd Webber wrote Jesus Christ Superstar at 23 and it remains the most subversive musical ever written. You can’t take that away from him. Or Evita, or Cats or Starlight Express. They were absolutely radical.

"I’m totally disinterested in whether someone’s wealthy, or in their politics. He wrote Jesus Christ Superstar and that’s enough. I don’t care about his baggy eyes.”